Different Views: What makes you feel safe in today's society?

What makes you feel safe? Is it police presence, solitude or are you comforted by the closeness of your community?

Trust, gentility and respect are lacking in our society today

Older Americans like my wife and I don't have the trust in other people today that we had as we grew up, even in the early years of our marriage. I can remember as a teenager living in Sharptown, leaving to visit relatives on a four-day trip and not even locking the doors of the house, because we knew our neighbors had our backs.

Today's society, primed by the in-your-face media, movies and TV, has lost the courteous behavior our parents lived by and taught to us. It feels a lot more threatening. Un-American groups such as the NRA and survivalists on the right preach insurrection against the government. Gangs are endemic in urban areas.

As we like to say, nothing is sacred anymore. We see road rage, failure to help others who have a mishap in the supermarket or in parking lots, and an unwillingness to accept compromise in order to govern our great country becoming the standard - not the exception as it was when we were younger.

Gentility is passe. Miss Manners has become very ill - if she has not already passed away. Can more police make us safer? If the NRA is correct, will arming everyone with more guns make us better people?

What this country needs is to admit that our baser emotional feelings can no longer be rewarded by supporting those who just say no to everything, claiming that is our heritage.

We will only become safer when we respect the dignity of even the weakest and most different among us. Hopefully, I will see that in the lifetime my wife and I have remaining.

Geoff Smoot

Hebron

I fear the lunatics taking over the asylum

I am not an anti-gun advocate. I believe the government has the right and duty to regulate and control certain weapons.

Free speech rights can be regulated, especially when seen as a danger to public safety. No one may yell "fire" in a crowded theater when no fire exists. The threat of injury supersedes that person's rights.

The Supreme Court has further defined certain speech, called "at-risk speech," as unprotected by the First Amendment, such as:

The First Amendment contains other rights that are regulated, including taxation of religious organizations: if they want to maintain tax-free status, they may not be involved in politics.

The founding fathers knew the world is evolving and changing, as they themselves had witnessed. They realized the only way to have a government endure was to give the people power and authority to make changes. Hence, one of the most important parts of the First Amendment: "the right of the people ... to petition the government for a redress of grievances."

They realized they were not infallible.

Gun advocates want to own "military-grade" weaponry. These "strict constructionists" think we'd all be safer if well-armed citizens, capable of fighting the "tyrannical" government, were camped across the street. I do not feel safer in that scenario. My fear is that the lunatics are taking over the asylum - and they are armed to the teeth. As a result, we don't know the "good guys" from the "bad guys." They all want to walk down the street with AR-15s slung over their shoulders.

Ron Pagano

Salisbury

Military, police and my own firearms make me feel safe

The U.S. Marine Corps, the U.S. Army, the U.S. Navy; the U.S. Air Force, Sheriff Mike Lewis and the firearms I have in my house.

Ernest I. Cornbrooks III

Salisbury

Our personal safety has never been guaranteed

The words " feel safe" are the defining ones here. At no time in the world's history has it been possible for mortal humans, to be completely safe.

Lack of this "safety guarantee" has different effects on people. It may result in neurosis or paranoia. Some may never live life to the fullest, seeing danger wherever they go. But most of us keep this fear at bay and early on, construct a way of life, a judgment of risks, a path of endeavors and an adherence to a faith or philosophy - all of which create comfort spaces where we can function.

I feel safe almost all of the time. I try to take heed of risks I might encounter. I always look for fire exits, follow traffic laws and heed my internal warnings in places where I am uncomfortable. I taught in an inner-city school where I had to learn to adapt because of the need to be safe. In driving through dangerous areas, I always left room in front of me at a light so I could quickly go around the car in front of me if I had to. I followed certain procedures traveling the neighborhood. (When I moved to The Shore, it was months before I stopped locking the "hook" on my steering wheel each night.) We lock our doors.

There are times when we really are not safe, sometimes with lethal results. But dwelling on something that may never happen keeps us from living life fully.

Barbara Doyle Schmid

Ocean Pines

Avoiding the mainstream media helps me feel safer

The best way I have found to feel safe is to stop watching "Mainstream Media" (MSM) on television. To listen to MSM newscasts, one would begin to believe there is a "boogie man" around every corner.

MSM and our politicians have vast responsibility for leading us into two wars in the past decade; they are constantly beating the drums for more military action around the world. They also like to play up all internal disorders to scare the public.

Worst of these is Fox News, the NRA and right-wing Republicans. They love to showcase the divisions among citizens of the United States to keep us angry and fearful of one another, when in reality we have much more in common than meets the eye.

Friction caused by the so-called news often leads to distrust and violence against our neighbors. It is difficult to find good news on MSM that allows our population to relax and enjoy our lives. There is no balance on the news whatsoever.

MSNBC has a stream of news programs that pits the left against the right. Fox News has the same line-up against the left. In the end, we all begin to lose our sense of safety and security.

Jimmy LaGarde

Pocomoke City

Being an American is enough to make me feel safe

There is much to worry about these days. We worry about getting a job or losing a job. We worry about the mole on our leg and the number on our scale, about our kids growing up and our parents growing old. We worry that Iran will get the bomb and that North Korea will use one. We worry about al Qaida being in Yemen, Syria and Mali - and hope they're not here.

We worry about drunk drivers and distracted drivers. We lose sleep over not getting enough sleep. We worry about how much we eat and how little we exercise. We worry about superstorms and rising seas. We worry about guns - some of us worry about people having them and some of us about losing them.

But we live in the United States. So I don't worry about being thrown in jail if I criticize the president. I feel safe driving over bridges and through tunnels. I am comforted knowing I can get hurt and be ably tended to. I am secure in my house and feel safe traveling away from my house.

I can practice my religion and you can practice yours, or not practice at all, and not feel threatened. I can stop at a store or be in a crowd and not worry about a bomb going off. If I need help I trust I can find help, no matter what the problem, day or night.

I feel safe being an American.

Rick Vail

Bishopville

Today's problems are not much different than yesterday's issues

There's an aura of safety and security in my life. I have no real fears; perhaps, because, my life, mostly behind me, was generally safe; my goals mostly achieved. And today's problems are little different from yesterday's problems.

"Safe and secure" are often used together, as in an 1877 hymn I thought of when first seeing this question. We frequently sang it in church when I was growing up: "Leaning, leaning, safe and secure from all alarms; Leaning, leaning, leaning on the everlasting arms."

But I can't say with confidence the hymn made me feel safe as a child - or that it has anything to do with my safe feelings today. As a child, I experienced more continuous fear than I have as an adult, much of it irrational. It included imaginary creatures, fighting the anti-Christ and real rats in our kitchen. After reading stories of dying children in "Grit" I was sure I was dying from cancer. The terror caused by a nighttime storm when I was 10 stands out.

Presently in America, of the world's many uncertainties, gun violence is in the forefront. Gun enthusiasts and nonenthusiasts feel equally unsafe. Enthusiasts fret about protecting themselves from crime, government conspiracies and banned guns. Nonenthusiasts rage about the inability of enthusiasts to keep their guns out of the hands of rogue destroyers.

With guns, it's the continued actual rarity and randomness of violent deaths that keeps my aura of safety for me and mine - at least, until tomorrow.

George T. Mason

Salisbury

Not much of anything makes me feel safe in today's society

Sad to say, very little. I was close to writing when I am inside my home, but even then, I give thought during the course of a day to the idea some knucklehead trying to make a living off of my living is going to come crashing through a door or window.

The reality is, we live in bleak times. Criminals and crime is more violent. Our governments, politicians, corporations and CEOs are more greedy and dishonest. We can't count on getting honest and impartial accounts of the news, because our news stations are owned by giant corporations whose interests are better served by doctoring the news or omitting certain news accounts to serve their greater good - not that of the nation.

We have all the information any one person could handle in a lifetime instantaneously at our fingertips, yet I have never seen our society so ignorant. Kids wanting to fit in and show their toughness used to do so by stealing a hubcap or tossing an egg.

Now the test is to put a bullet into someone's head.

Kids that didn't fit the "norm" at school would compensate by studying harder and becoming the class valedictorian. Now they veil themselves in dark thoughts and clothing, then march into their schools to kill their classmates and themselves.

In 2005, the Supreme Court ruled that citizens don't have a constitutional right to be protected from harm by the police. Now the politicians on their soapboxes so high are unintentionally pushing us all farther into harm's way.

Sadly, nothing makes me feel safe in today's society.

David R. Etheridge

Hebron

Living in Ocean Pines is enough to give my life comfort and security

Living in Ocean Pines makes me feel safe.

Before moving to the beach, we lived in Philadelphia, Pa. Street related gang warfare, burglary and car theft was common to the point many people didn't bat an eye when the news reported two or three deaths in a gang skirmish. After all, this was all part of living in the city.

Now, having a home here for going on 20 years and living here for more than 10 years, I have a found a new level of comfort, confidence and safety. Although the Pines is not an incorporated community, we have more than 15,000 residents. Yet there is a great friendship and caring amongst our neighbors.

We help each other in times of trouble and need. We look out for a neighbor or friend who might be away for several days, to ensure their homes are OK.

When called, our police have responded with multiple units in less than a minute. Our fire department's response time is infinitely better than response times in the city. I feel assured that our drinking water is safe to use at all times.

We have a beautiful golf course, sparkling swimming pools (open air and enclosed), tennis courts and many athletic fields. Our schools are highly rated. We have have outstanding houses of worship.

In fact there is nothing lacking for a great quality of life. All in all, I'm glad I have relocated to the Pines for its warmth, friendliness and safety.

Arie Klapholz

Ocean Pines

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Different Views: What makes you feel safe in today's society?

Older Americans like my wife and I don't have the trust in other people today that we had as we grew up, even in the early years of our marriage.